--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "fournet.arnaud"
<fournet.arnaud@...> wrote:
>
> I still have more than one problem with
> Russian serga being from Gotic aus(ôn)-ring-
> German has either Ohr- or Ohren- as compound form.
> Equivalent to Gotic either aus- or ausôn-
> Gotic from Streitberg : Ausô(-n) Neuter -N "Ohr"
> so we can expect two forms :
> *ausôn-ring or *aus-ring
The n-stems as the first elements in compounds have -a- as a
bindvowel (W. Braune, K. Helm. Gotische Grammatik. 13. Aufl.
Halle/Saale 1952. P.53). Examples are auga-dauro (augo N.-n),
wilja-halþei (wilja M.-n), qina-kunds (qino F.-n) etc. So the
Gothic "earring" was likely *ausa-hriggs (-gg- for [ng]). *-hriggs
is not attested in the Bible (figgra-gulþ, lit. "finger gold" is
used instead to translate Greek daktulion in Luc. 15:22), but
Busbeque's report of Crimean Gothic has 'rinck sive ringo' for
Latin 'annulus' (sic!) (W. Streitberg. Gotisches Elementarbuch.
5-6 Aufl. Heidelberg. 1920. P.281), hence *hriggs is a pretty safe
Wulfilan reconstruction.
The only and minor problem with OCSl usereNgU < Go. *ausa-hriggs
that I can see is the e- from Gothic binding a- whereas we should
expect o-, like in OCSl vinogradU < Go. weina-gards. Is it due to
the eN- in the next syllable?
> As you can see, serga precisely exhibits
> syllables and vowels that "nicely" fits in the holes
> of Gotic potential words.
I agree that this form (Rus. ser'ga) looks pretty irregular. Not
that it devaluates the proposed etymology completely, IMHO.
> Gotic stress is expected on either aus- or ring-
> precisely where Russian has nothing : no syllables at all.
As we can infer from what we know of the Old Germanic accentuation
the main stress in the Gothic word lay on aus- and the secondary one
on hriggs. OCSl shifts the stress upon reNg- (< -hriggs). And we
can speculate what happened further. Unstressed u- gets interpreted
as a prefix and is eventually dropped. The nasal eN- > -ia- pretty
early in Russian. The word becomes feminine (OCSl usereNgU is masc.
and Rus. ser'ga is fem.). The stress moves to the feminine ending
a. The unstressed ia- gets ultimately reduced to '- ("miagkij
znak", the palatalizer).
This scenario may be wrong and I stand open to your criticism.
> the -eN- be it nasalized cannot the continuation of
> either Gothic ôn or zero.
It isn't. It continues Go. in(g)-. In Russian, the '- is present
in its stead. Note also the diminutive Rus. seriozhka "idem"
< *(u)seriazhIka (?).
> Nothing works.
I wouldn't say so categorically.
> I consider this derivation of serga from Gotic
> as ***completely*** impossible on phonetic grounds.
>
> Arnaud